


Jack-O-Lantern Light (Carve Out a Future Just for Us)

by WildWolf25



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alien Cultural Differences, Cultural Differences, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Halloween, Pre-Canon, galraween2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-06
Updated: 2018-11-06
Packaged: 2019-08-19 17:15:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16538840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WildWolf25/pseuds/WildWolf25
Summary: Krolia looked doubtfully at the hard plastic vessel in her hands.  It was a bright, unnatural-looking orange, yet somehow, the vegetable that it was based on was not considered toxic to humans.  There was a hole at the top and the thing was hollowed out, with a little black plastic handle looped across the top.  On the front (she assumed) were bizarre black markings; two triangles, an upside-down triangle below them, and a… strange shape, that looked a bit like a moon turned on its side with portions removed.  Ken had told her the markings made a face, but Krolia had to use a bit of imagination to see it as such.She raised her eyes from the peculiar vessel to the slightly-ajar bathroom door, where she could see one shoulder of Ken’s jacket, one leg, and one shoe.  “Are you sure this is safe?  All of our intel has indicated that the sight of an alien on this planet will cause a panic.”“Not tonight, it won’t.”  Ken’s voice called back from the bathroom.  “I told you; it’s Halloween.  Everyone is just going to assume you’re wearing a really cool costume.”





	Jack-O-Lantern Light (Carve Out a Future Just for Us)

**Author's Note:**

> _*slides into November frazzled and wearing a pumpkin hat* "Halloween is a state of mind, not a date"_ (This is almost a week late but my life was a little hectic Halloween week, apologies)
> 
> This was originally written for the Galraween2018 exchange on tumblr but my giftee had to drop out. I already had the fic finished, though, so I just sprinkled in some more personal headcanons for the heck of it and I'm posting it anyway. Enjoy this belated ~~trick-or-~~ treat, for anyone who likes it!
> 
> **As a warning if you are squeamish about blood,** there’s a part that _seems_ like it’s about blood but it’s _fake blood_ , like that costume stuff. But Krolia doesn’t know that and she is the narrator, so there’s one paragraph that reads like its about an injury but it’s not. It’s very short, but I didn’t want to alarm anyone.

Krolia looked doubtfully at the hard plastic vessel in her hands.  It was a bright, unnatural-looking orange, yet somehow, the vegetable that it was based on was not considered toxic to humans.  There was a hole at the top and the thing was hollowed out, with a little black plastic handle looped across the top. On the front (she assumed) were bizarre black markings; two triangles, an upside-down triangle below them, and a… strange shape, that looked a bit like a moon turned on its side with portions removed.  Ken had told her the markings made a face, but Krolia had to use a bit of imagination to see it as such. 

She raised her eyes from the peculiar vessel to the slightly-ajar bathroom door, where she could see one shoulder of Ken’s jacket, one leg, and one shoe.  “Are you sure this is safe? All of our intel has indicated that the sight of an alien on this planet will cause a panic.” 

“Not tonight, it won’t.”  Ken’s voice called back from the bathroom.  “I told you; it’s Halloween. Everyone is just going to assume you’re wearing a really cool costume.”

Krolia was still doubtful.  “I have purple skin.” 

“Makeup.”  Ken stuck his hand out the door and waved a tube of green at her, and she noticed his arm was smudged with the stuff to give himself the skin color of an Olkari.  

“My eyes are yellow.  And purple.” Krolia added.  

“Colored contacts.”  Ken shot back.

“My armor  _ glows _ .”  

“You’d be surprised what cosplayers these days come up up with using LED lights.”  Ken said. “If you’re  _ really  _ worried about it, we can always cut some eye-holes in a sheet and throw it over you, and you can be a ghost.”  

Krolia made a face.  She did not like that idea at all.

Ken chuckled, as if he could sense her expression without seeing her.  “You’ll be fine. I promise.” 

Krolia let out a frustrated huff.  He was countering her every objection, but she was still uncertain whether this would work, simply because she didn’t  _ know  _ this planet.  Sure, she knew the chemical composition of its atmosphere, the fact that 75% of it was covered in water, and the geologic caves around here that might hold a Blue Lion.  But the culture and customs of this planet’s people had been entirely absent from her mission specs, other than one giant warning not to be spotted by them. And yes, she had already failed that, since she moved in with and began a relationship with a human.  But it was just one. And he was very tempting, she hadn’t been able to resist. She told herself she wouldn’t let herself be seen by another human. But then, Ken had taken her by surprise by suggesting they go into town together, a town surrounded by the very humans she knew she should avoid.  

She shifted the strange, orange, bucket-like vessel to one hand and picked up the newspaper Ken had brought her earlier.  She was still slow to decipher the letters, so different from Galran, and the meaning of the words was even more foreign to her:  _ Red Mesa Halloween Festival to feature pumpkin carving, tailgate trick-or-treating, and costume contest.  Fun for all ages! _  Below the headline was a photograph of children in the strangest clothes Krolia had ever seen (even among aliens) holding aloft those round, apparently-not-aposematic, orange-colored vegetables and grinning in delight at the camera.  Tucked away into the center of the newspaper was the glossy advertisement page that usually went ignored, but Ken had made a point to show her all the sale items of kids costumes and bags of candy as he explained the customs of this holiday.  She could read the little descriptions under the pictures, but still hadn’t any idea what most of them -- zombie, werewolf, Wonder Woman, genie, storm trooper, fairy -- were. The only ones that were recognizable were the princess (but that wasn’t a  _ costume _ , she had protested, that was a  _ title  _ and  _ political position _ ) and if she squinted, the witch, which she could see as being somewhat similar to a druid.  Why any parent would allow their child to pretend to be such a power-hungry fanatic so corrupted by quintessence that they had little respect for life, though, was beyond her.

Krolia eyed the photograph of the kids carrying orange buckets brimming with colorfully-wrapped sweets, then looked at that same bucket in her other hand.  Would this really be enough to convince people she was a human wearing a disguise? 

“Ah!  Shoot.”  Ken’s muttered curse from the bathroom drew her attention again.  “Darn it, I got blood in my eye…”

The orange bucket fell from her hands with a loud clatter and she ran to him.  “You’re bleeding?! What happened?” She yanked open the bathroom door and gasped at the sight.  His forehead was sliced open and thick, red blood was dripping from the wound, while his face was so pale he was nearly green, with smudges of brown that could be an infection!  “Ken! Why didn’t you say anything?! Let me get the first aid kit--” 

“No, no, Kro, it’s okay!”  Ken laughed. Why was he laughing??  He was gravely injured! “Babe, it’s just costume makeup and fake blood, relax.  See?” He held up a few tubes of green, white, and brown pigment, the labels featuring humans with colored lines drawn under their eyes and ‘ _ go sports! _ ’ in whatever color was being advertised, and a bottle full of dark red liquid whose label read ‘ _ fake blood _ ’ in dripping, spooky font.  

Narrowing her eyes in suspicion, Krolia grabbed his head like she might a squirming Galran cub and carefully pushed the pad of her thumb through the line of red above his brow.  It smudged, but the skin underneath was unbroken. It also didn’t smell anything like blood, when she sniffed at the substance on her thumb. It just smelled like chemicals. She frowned.  “Is this a defense tactic? To appear wounded, so enemies will leave you alone?” 

“No, it’s just to look spooky.”  Ken leaned closer to mirror and used a paintbush to fix the spot she had smudged.  The mirror was spotted with age and cracked from an unfortunate incident involving a dust-storm, a rock, and a broken latch on the window shutter.  It was still a decent mirror, but it did make his current appearance a little more… eerie, she thought. That is, until he smiled at her reflection behind him.  “The fake blood is only meant to give a good-natured scare to kids. And aliens, apparently.” 

Krolia huffed and crossed her arms, leaning against the doorframe to watch him.  “You cannot fault me for being concerned.” What else was she supposed to think, when her mate declared he was bleeding?  

“No, it’s sweet of you.”  Ken flashed her a grin in the mirror.  He looked down to screw the cap onto the bottle of fake blood, and she noticed that he had two metal screws stuck to the sides of his neck, the bases covered in a layer of makeup.  He was also wearing an older jacket with holes and patches in it, that looked like it had been rubbed through the dirt. Ken lived far out in the desert, but he did laundry regularly with what water he could spare and he was hardly ‘dirty’, so she had to assume this was part of the costume.  

“What costume is this supposed to portray?”  Krolia asked, curious. 

“Frankenstein.”  Ken replied. “Or Frankenstein’s monster, technically.”  He noticed her blank look in the mirror and smiled. “We’ll rent the movie from the library when we go into town.”  He promised. 

Her lips pinched together.  “And you’re sure I should go into town with you?”  

“Positive.”  He nudged her out of the bathroom and turned off the light as they left.  “It’ll be fun, no one will know you’re not human, and besides, we’re long overdue for a proper first date.”  

She nodded thoughtfully.  Their courtship was unconventional by both of their standards.  Their ‘dates’ so far had been hiking and motorcycle rides in the desert, rather than going out to dinner or the movies like Ken said was normal.  Likewise, Krolia’s attempts to announce her desire for courtship via presenting him with the carcasses of animals she had hunted for him was met with bewilderment, as well as a lecture that some of those species were endangered and that she shouldn’t do that, though he appreciated the gesture.  

Ken loaded up several bright packages of candy, a large bowl, a bag of apples, and a few water bottles (desert-dweller’s habit) into a backpack and handed it to Krolia to wear on her back.  Then they climbed onto his bike, her holding onto his waist, and they took off, their shadow stretching in front of them as the setting sun behind them cast a pink-orange glow over the mountains.  Krolia grew nervous as the dirt road turned to pavement and the heat-wavering flickering lights of the town grew closer. She nervously adjusted her grip around his middle when they passed by the first houses on the outskirts of the town, and he reached down to squeeze her hand reassuringly.  He dropped his speed when they got closer to town, probably because there were a number of people lining the sidewalks and children in costumes occasionally running across the street while parents shouted after them to be careful. Krolia started to feel a little better about this idea, the more she saw how everyone was dressed; some were half-assed attempts to be funny, but others had obviously put a lot of effort into making their appearance as outlandish as possible, and likely convincing of their character (if Krolia had known what they were, of course).  Perhaps she really wouldn’t look quite so out-of-place among them. 

Still, she couldn’t help but feel a sense of alarm shoot through her when they slowed to a halt for a red light, and a small child wearing a black robe and red-and-yellow striped scarf stopped walking to stare at her, mouth open and eyes wide behind circular glasses.  The child pointed at her, and Krolia had to physically restrain herself from reaching for her blade before the little thing could expose her-- 

“Wow, Miss!  Great costume!”  The child exclaimed, displaying a missing front tooth when he grinned at her.

“Thanks, she worked real hard on it!”  Ken, stars bless him, swooped in to save her (no doubt he could feel her nervous grip crushing his ribcage.  “Yer a great wizard, kid!” He took a bright-colored candy out of his jacket pocket and tossed it to the child.  

The child laughed.  “Thanks, Mister!” He waved a short stick in the air, the meaning of which was completely lost on Krolia, before running off.  

The light changed to green and Krolia could not have been more relieved as they finally sped away from that intersection.  

“See?  I told you people would think it was a costume.”  Ken told her over the rushing wind. 

“Spies aren’t used to being  _ seen _ .”  Krolia buried her face in the back of his neck and wrinkled her nose in distaste; he smelled like chemicals and paint.  

They turned down another street, and already they were in the center of downtown (really, it was more a single street housing the few shops of the small, desert town).  Ken turned into the parking lot of a low, adobe building with red-stone pillars supporting the eaves which born the words ‘ _ Red Mesa Town Hall _ ’ in faded letters.  The building might have been old, with a few cracks running up the facade and one window pane bearing a spider-web shatter from a rogue baseball years ago, but the parking lot was lit up with colored lights and fluorescent green gauze stretched between the pillars, a gigantic spider perched in the webbing over the door.  The majority of the parking lot was a mix of people selling food and drinks, tables where kids were hard at work making paper-plate pumpkins, spiders, and witch hats, and costume-clad adults sitting in lawn-chairs outside their parked cars with large bowls of candy on their laps as they chatted. Ken waved to a couple of these people as he navigated his bike to an empty spot beside the fence and parked.  

“What is all this?”  Krolia asked, looking around the scene in awe.  

“There’s a lot of us that live well outside the town proper.”  Ken explained, kicking the stand down and cutting the engine. “Kids don’t want to hike all the way to the outskirts of town just for candy, and parents don’t want that either -- not safe, you know -- so anyone who wants to get in on the Halloween spirit but lives far away can set up camp here.  Folks from the nearby reservation also bring their kids so they can trick-or-treat without having to walk a long distance between houses in the dark.” He waved to a man selling what looked like circular, flat loaves of bluish-purple bread, who smiled and lifted his hand to return the greeting. Ken looked around at the festive scene, his expression fond.  “It’s nice for the kids who live outside of town to get the same chance to have some fun. If I ever have a kid, I’ll definitely bring them here every year.”

Krolia was quiet as he busied himself with opening their backpack and dumping packages of candy into the bowl they had brought.  “You want to have children, then?” She asked, her voice careful. 

“Oh yeah,” Ken nodded and zipped the backpack shut.  “I love them. Me and Sean and Bobby, we’re the ones at the station that always volunteer to go to the schools around here to teach the kids about fire safety.  It was kind of a drag at first, but the kids are just the sweetest things and I grew to love it. Makes me look forward to the day I have my own.” He hopped up to sit on the railing of the fence and balanced the bowl on his lap; already, there were kids across the parking lot zeroing in on the new source of candy.  Ken looked over at her. “How about you? Do you want kids?”

Krolia was spared having to answer right away by a child running up to them.

“Trick or treat!”  A little girl wearing a white dress with feather-covered wings on her back and a pipe-cleaner halo bouncing above her head interrupted them to hold out a pillowcase filled with sweets.  

“Hey!”  Ken’s face lit up and he hopped off the fence to hold the bowl where she could reach.  “What a pretty angel! Here you go, sweetheart.” 

“Can I take one for my brother, too?”  She pointed to a little boy younger than her, dressed in red with horns, standing a few yards back and sucking his thumb as he watched an animatronic witch wave her broom and cackle when people got too close to the sensor.  

“Of course you can, go ahead.”  Ken told her. 

The girl did so and ran off, and Krolia waited for her to take her brother’s hand and get far enough away so as not to overhear them.

“I never considered it, when I was fighting on the front lines of a war.”  Krolia admitted quietly. To her, it was unthinkable to bring a life into a world so full of hardship and strife, where only one mission gone wrong would rip her away from them and leave them to grow up alone.  She looked around the colorful parking lot, so full of laughter and life and so very different from the war broiling just outside their solar system. She smiled as she watched a toddler dressed as a pumpkin lift their arms up, hands grasping at the air, and their mother lean down to pick them up.  “If I could stay here, where it is safe, then yes. I would.” 

Ken smiled softly and took her hand, giving it a squeeze before threading their fingers together.  

~~~~~~~

They stayed off to the side for a little while, but eventually people started beckoning Ken over to their little spaces to chat.  Krolia was incredibly nervous and offered to stay at their post with the bowl of candy, but Ken said the kids didn’t mind more than one bowl of candy at each station.  He took her hand, but he might have regretted that a few moments later when her grip tightened on his hand like a vice as someone called out “Hey Ken! Who’s your pretty lady friend?”

“It’s okay.”  Ken whispered to her, before turning to the man with a smile.  “This is my wife, Krolia. She travels a lot for work.” 

Krolia was not quite familiar with one word in that sentence, but managed to mask her confusion well.  That is, until surprised shouts of “your  _ wife _ ?!”  “Since when are you married?!”  “Wife??” and “No way! She’s way out of your league!” went up around the circle.  

“She is, and I thank my lucky stars she picked me.”  Ken winked at her. Krolia suppressed a smile. Lucky ‘stars’, indeed.  

“Your costume looks  _ amazing _ , hon.”  An older woman with a witches hat perched on her silver hair said.  “My lord, how’d you get your skin and eyes like that?” 

“Uh,” Krolia’s mind went blank with panic.  She could diffuse a bomb in less than ten ticks, but she was clueless here.  

“She’s a professional makeup artist, for Hollywood.”  Ken cut in smoothly. 

“Ah so that’s why we haven’t see ya around before…” a man reclining in a lawn chair nodded sagely.  “Off in the big city making movies, huh?” 

“...Yes.”  Krolia nodded like she had any idea what she was talking about.  

“Ooh, fascinating!”  The woman’s glasses glinted as she brightened at that.  “Would we have seen any of your work? What movies?” 

“Um.”  Krolia cast around frantically, somehow forgetting the title to every movie Ken had showed her.  Her gaze settled on a couple of children walking past dressed up, one in a flowing pink dress and tiara, the other wearing cardboard boxes spray-painted silver.  “Princess… Robot.” She finished lamely. Did that sound like a movie title?? 

Ken’s friends blinked and exchanged confused looks.  Ken’s chuckle was just a little forced. “It’s uh, an indie film.  Weirdly popular in… Portugal.” He slid an arm around her waist and squeezed reassuringly, a rock in the storm of her panic.  “She also did the makeup for, um,  _ Alien _ .  And  _ E.T. _  And some work on  _ Avatar _ .”  

The people around them nodded and ‘ _ oooh _ ’-ed and ‘ _ aaah _ ’-ed, so Krolia’s deceased soul tentatively settled back in her body.  Stars bless him, Ken then skillfully changed the topic. “And where’s your costume?”  He nudged the man in the lawn chair. 

“I’m a firefighter.”  The man replied. 

“I know, Chief, I work with you.”  Ken laughed. “You can’t just wear your uniform and call it a Halloween costume.”

The fire chief grumbled something about respecting one’s elders, while Krolia cast Ken a sidelong look;  _ she  _ was wearing her Blade uniform and no costume whatsoever, and he had told her it would be fine. 

“You said your name was Crowley, honey?”  

It took her a moment to realize the woman was talking to her.  “Krolia.” She corrected. 

“Krolia, that’s a beautiful name.”  The woman nodded, and the spider hanging from her witch hat bobbed with the movement.  “You know, I tried to dye my hair blonde some years ago -- turned out all uneven. What’s your secret?  What brand is it?”

“Um.”  Krolia didn’t know what to say; it just grew like that.  “I, uh, can’t remember the title-- I mean brand.” 

“Well you let me know, if you remember it.”  She patted Krolia’s arm. “That color looks so nice… maybe I should dye mine purple, too!”  

Krolia froze, wondering if she had just accidentally started a new trend of women dying their hair purple (was there a chance that could attract the Galra to this planet??) but the woman’s husband cut in with a quip that doing so “would make you look even more like a witch than that hat”, and then some more children showed up asking for candy and the conversation seemed to fade away.  

After the kids moved on, Ken handed the candy bowl off to his friend.  “Here, hold this.”

“What am I supposed to do with this?  I’m diabetic!” The man asked.

“Hand it out to the kids, like the adult you’re supposed to be!”  Ken laughed, taking Krolia’s hand again. The man waved him off with a good-natured “ _ psha! _ ”, and Krolia let Ken lead her across the parking lot.  On their way, they were stopped by a man with square glasses and brown hair going silver, dressed in long black robes with a strange black helmet sitting on the table in front of him, along with a bowl of candy and a couple of thermoses.  Standing beside him was a woman in a long white dress and her hair (was it her hair? It was a different shade of brown than the rest of her hair…) in two braided coils on either side of her head, who was pouring something from the thermos into a paper cup.  On her back in a carrier was a small baby whose flyaway auburn hairs had been braided into a single thin braid on the side of his head. 

“Hey, Sam!”  Ken greeted. “Woah, what’s going on here?  How are you Darth Vader, but your wife is Leia and your son is Anakin?  What timeline is that?”

“Collen wanted to be Leia, and you know how she won’t budge once she sets her mind to something.”  The man, Sam, shrugged. 

“And  _ he  _ wanted to be able to say ‘ _ Matt I am your father _ ’, despite Matt knowing all of three words at the moment.”  Colleen laughed and elbowed her husband. 

“Guilty as charged.”  Sam chuckled. “Good to see you around, Ken.  And who’s your friend?” 

“This is my wife, Krolia,” Ken pulled her close.  Colleen’s eyes lit up at the statement. Krolia was really going to have to ask him what that word meant, when she got a chance.  She let him repeat the same story about her being a makeup artist in Hollywood, wherever that was, and the two seemed to buy it, but Sam’s gaze lingered on Krolia’s face for just a moment too long for her to be comfortable.  Luckily, though, he smiled again and asked her if she would like some apple cider. 

“The Holts make the best apple cider around.”  Ken said, handing Colleen a thin piece of greenish paper that Krolia identified as a form of Earth currency.  “You’ve gotta try it.” 

“For an extra fifty cents, you can have one with a little extra kick to it.”  Sam whispered conspicuously and nudged a bottle that read ‘bourbon’ on the label.  

Ken laughed, but Krolia looked doubtfully at the cup of ocher-colored liquid she had been handed.  She really needed to update her automatic translator, because she failed to see how something without feet could possibly ‘kick’.  At Ken’s encouraging look, she took a sip, and her eyes widened at the burst of flavor and heat; not just the temperature but the savory spiced taste and the way it ran down her throat.  “Oh!” She noticed the Holts’ curious looks, and cleared her throat. “I apologize. The food where I come from is much more bland.” Hardly more than goo, in fact. 

“Oh, so the Midwest?”  Sam winked, and Krolia didn’t understand that but his wife rounded on him and pointed her cider-ladle threateningly at him.  Ken laughed, though, so Krolia gave an awkward chuckle.

When they finished their little cups of cider, Ken took Krolia by the hand again and told the Holts they were going to look at the houses around the neighborhood.  Krolia hadn’t the faintest idea why -- was he considering buying one? Moving closer to town? She liked his house... -- but the Holts acted like that was a normal thing to do and waved as the two of them left.  They left the town hall parking lot, and Krolia began to see what he had meant; the houses were decked out with lights and plastic decorations, creating a most outlandish look. Krolia had been to a number of alien planets, but none looked so bizarre and  _ alien _ as these.  Between them all, kids in costumes ran up and down the sidewalk knocking on doors and reciting that same ‘ _ trick or treat! _ ’ line she had heard before, but still couldn’t make sense of.  She noticed that some of the smaller children seemed scared and refused to go near certain houses, usually the ones with less colorful and more dark decor.  She wondered why. Other than color scheme, she wasn’t sure what the difference was. 

“Woah, look at that!”  Ken pointed, and Krolia followed his finger to what looked like… well, not humans, but human-like creatures made of plastic were posed as if crawling out of the ground.  Their clothes were splattered with red paint and their faces were twisted and grotesque with flat white eyes lacking a pupil. Not unlike some Galra, she thought absently.  And she couldn’t recall humanoid creatures living in the ground in any of her intel on this planet. Ken turned to her. “Pretty scary, huh?” 

Krolia tilted her head and considered the partially-unearthed plastic hominid.  “Is it supposed to be?” She asked, feeling foolish. Its expression troubled her a little -- it looked distressed -- but she wouldn’t qualify it as frightening.  

Ken looked taken aback for a moment, then seemed to realize something.  “Ah, you’ve probably never heard of a zombie, have you?” He lowered his voice.  When Krolia shook her head, he explained. “See, that flat thing behind it is a headstone, a marker used for graves when we bury a dead body.  A zombie is a body that comes back from the dead and tries to kill people -- they’re not real, of course, but people are scared of death, so they make up monsters like that.”  

Krolia looked at the decoration again, and suddenly felt very uncomfortable.  She looked up and down the street and noticed a number of those flat, rounded ‘headstones’ in other yards.  “Grave markers aren’t meant to be decorations.” She said, her words coming out flat and heavy. 

“I… no, you’re probably right.”  Ken admitted. “These ones aren’t real, though.  The real ones, marking actual people, those are in the cemetery, and they’re respected.”

Krolia swallowed hard as she looked at the plastic monster -- with its very Galra eyes -- and looked away.  They walked along in silence for a few minutes, and eventually the infectious cheer of the crowd began to lift Krolia’s spirits a little again.  She knew he hadn’t meant to make her uncomfortable; as a human and a Galra, they were no strangers to cultural differences here and there over the course of their relationship.

Thinking of that reminded Krolia of something.  “That word you used, with your friends. What does it mean?”  She asked him.

Ken looked confused.  “What word?”

Krolia had to think for a moment to remember it.  “Wife.” 

Even under his pale green face paint, Krolia spotted a blush color Ken’s cheeks.  “Ah… well, that’s a word for when two people are married. They’re a husband and a wife.  It describes their relationship, and their devotion to each other.”

Krolia perked up.  “Oh, like a mate?” 

Ken paused.  “Well, humans don’t really use that word for other humans, just animals.  But I guess yeah, that’s a similar concept.”

Krolia smiled and slid her arm around his waist.  “Here I was courting you, and you had already decided we were mates-- or what did you call it?  Wifes?”

“Husband and wife.  A married couple.” Ken chuckled, and Krolia made an effort to commit the terms to memory.  “Sorry for kinda springing that on you. I could’ve said ‘girlfriend’ but I don’t know, I feel like that’s not enough for how I feel about you.”  

“So this ‘married’ is like the highest level of mateship among humans?”  Krolia checked. Clearly, whoever had created her translation software hadn’t placed much stock in relationship words -- sure, it had ‘hydrogen’ and ‘topography’, but not ‘girlfriend’ and ‘wife’?  

“Yeah, you could say that.”  Ken squeezed her hand. 

“Hm, I like that.”  Krolia smiled. “We’re married, then.”  

Ken laughed.  “I mean, we would have to get it done in a church or town hall or something official, and I’m supposed to give you a ring -- ah, not even in that order, shoot…” 

Krolia’s foot struck a piece of brightly-colored packaging that must have fallen out of some child’s candy bag.  She caught a glimpse of the picture on it before it skittered too far away, and picked it up to read the front:  _ ring pop _ .  There was indeed a picture of a ring on the front, but the gemstone was very big and for some reason the child in the picture was licking it.  Strange humans... 

“This should suffice.”  She told Ken, pushing the package into his hand.  “There, I’ve given you a ring. We’re married mates now.”  

She thought she did it correctly, but Ken laughed uproariously.  Not at her, she could tell, and his laughter was infectious for her so she couldn’t help but laugh too.  

“Alright, then.”  Ken opened the packaging and slid the strange-looking ring onto his finger (it only barely fit on his pinky).  He held it up, letting the light from the street-lamps illuminate the shiny red gem (gem? Plastic?). He turned to her and cupped her cheek.  “Can I kiss my bride?” 

Krolia really would have to update her translation chip with relation words.  “You can kiss your wife.” She linked her arms around his neck. 

“Even better.”  He chuckled warmly and drew her in for a kiss.  

It was short and chaste, given they were on a public sidewalk surrounded by families, but it was sweet.      

They pulled apart and strolled along the sidewalk leisurely, hands linked between them, and watched as children dressed up hurried around in groups or with parents to collect candy and laugh together.  It was nice, even if Krolia didn’t understand everything that was going on. 

“Do you have any holidays like this?  Any harvest festivals?” Ken asked as they passed by a bale of straw with a few pumpkins around it, a strange, humanoid-looking stick with clothes on standing guard over the display.

Krolia thought about it for a moment, then shook her head.  “I came from a very poor planet, with few natural resources.  We had no agriculture to harvest, just some trading posts.” She paused, tilting her head slightly as she watched a cloth-covered object flutter in the wind.  Ken had called it a ‘ghost’, but it looked different than her image of a ghost. More cheerful, somehow. 

She went on thoughtfully.  “Death has always been a very real part of our lives, in the Galra Empire.  We’ve been embroiled in war for thousands of years. We do have a sort of celebration… a memorial day, to remember the dead.  It’s somewhat like a festival, I suppose; families gather together, as we clean the grave markers of our ancestors and fallen loved ones.  It’s supposed to be a celebration of life and the time we still have before death, but… it’s nothing like this.” She said quietly, watching a group of laughing children dressed as skeletons and ghosts run past excitedly.  It was exceptionally strange, this cheerful, festive air around a holiday with ties to death. Not like her planet at all. But, she thought, perhaps that wasn’t bad. 

It was a bit like the lanterns she could see on every house’s porch and yard; each was made of those strange orange vegetables, hollowed out and lit with a flickering candle or two.  But each and every one was carved with a different design, particular to the one who had carved it. Shaky lines creating simple triangle-eyed faces, scary sharp-toothed grins, grotesque visages in pain… even incredibly detailed carvings of things like trees and cats and the moon and stars… each and every one of them was carved differently, but they all glowed with the same warm light.  

Somehow, it gave her hope that she and Ken could carve out a future of their own making together here, on this little blue planet.  

She smiled faintly and squeezed his hand.  “I think I like this. It’s different, and I’m not entirely used to it.  But I want to be. I want to grow accustomed to it, and celebrate with you every year.  And perhaps, one day, with our family.” That was an idea she very, very much liked. 

Ken returned her smile and leaned in to kiss her cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> BONUS SCENE:  
> Ken: *chomps into the ring pop and bites off a chunk*  
> Krolia, staring at him aghast: “.....what the ever-living fuck, Ken”  
> Ken: “uh… you know this is candy, right? Not an actual gemstone?”   
> ~~She totally thought he just cronched a gigantic ruby~~
> 
> If you caught it, the town name Red Mesa is Night Vale's neighboring city that is "a friendly desert community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and mysterious spaceships bring gorgeous purple alien space wives" (I briefly considered naming it Desert Bluffs as it’s more well-known, but no one likes Desert Bluffs)
> 
> Part of my inspiration for this came from having grown up celebrating Halloween and then moving to a country where it doesn’t have the same meaning, and experiencing that disconnect between how I see the holiday and how it is seen by people who didn’t grow up in the same environment/culture. The context is lost, and even with explanation, it’s not quite the same, and that’s just a part of navigating cultural differences. 
> 
> Please let me know if you liked it! I know it's a small pairing and one person in it still doesn't have a canon name, but I love these two. I also have a I have a [ tumblr](http://gold-leeaf.tumblr.com/).
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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